


Baseball Shirts

by bjfic_archivist



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: Canon, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Prequel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-12-20
Updated: 2004-12-20
Packaged: 2018-12-27 01:41:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12071079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bjfic_archivist/pseuds/bjfic_archivist
Summary: Takes place shortly after Brian and Michael have met.   Not B/M.





	Baseball Shirts

**Author's Note:**

> Note from IrishCaelan, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Brian_Justin_Fanfiction_Archive). To preserve the archive, I began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in September 2017. I posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/bjfic/profile).

POV: Brian, aged 14 

This was inspired by the clothes Brian is wearing in the Patrick Swayze picture scene. (That scene was the October picture on my QAF calendar, so I saw a great deal of it.) However, fear not: that scene does not appear in the story!

* * *

I saw the baseball shirts when I was clothes-shopping with Mom, and I just had to have one. She was busy picking out the usual cheap, unstylish clothes that she always gets me. 

"It isn't worthwhile buying you more expensive clothes, Brian, because you grow out of them so quickly," she always says. And I guess she has a point because I am growing like crazy right now. This, in fact, was why we were clothes-shopping in May. Mom doesn't like buying me new clothes so close to the end of the school year, but she didn't have a lot of choice because I had outgrown practically every item of clothing I owned. 

While she was busy picking out some inexpensive and unattractive jeans and t-shirts, I wandered over to the racks of better clothing. When I grow up, I'm never going to wear anything but well-made clothes. You can always tell when something is quality, even if it is just a white t-shirt. Anyway, I saw a rack of baseball shirts. They're really popular right now at school. Virtually everyone has one. They look kind of dumb on short kids, because they tend to be fairly long, so it makes them look like they're wearing a dress over their jeans, but with my height, I knew it'd hang right. I checked out the price tag on one of the shirts. Not bad. Not good, but not as bad as it might have been. 

"Mom, can I..." I began. 

"No, Brian," she said, barely glancing up from her close scrutiny of what had to be the ugliest buttoned-down shirt I had ever seen. 

"Really, they aren't that expensive, Mom," I said. "Just one." She looked up, with an annoyed expression on her face, and I suddenly wished I had not pressed the issue. Not that she was likely to start yelling at me right there in the store - Mom would never make a scene in public - but she might tell Pop that I'd been a brat while shopping when we got home, and then I'd be in for it. 

"Sorry," I mumbled, hoping to avoid a later scene. "I won't ask again." Mom just kind of looked at me, and then, to my great surprise, she came over to the rack and fingered a price tag.

"Well," she said, "I suppose since this is your birthday present, you could get one. Just don't tell your father how much it cost." I gave her an incredulous look - as if I would ever dream of doing that! - and thanked her as I selected the one I wanted. 

I was amazed that Mom agreed to get it. I guess she was feeling guilty about my 14th birthday a few days before. Pop said that if I need a bunch of new clothes, I wasn't getting anything else, and so I hadn't got a present from my parents or from Claire. It wasn't a completely presentless birthday, though. My new friend Mikey gave me a Captain Astro comic-book, which was very nice of him, although I did rather suspect that he had an ulterior motive, given that it is his desire to turn everyone he meets into the rabid Captain Astro fan that he is. That is how we became friends, actually. I had barely taken my seat in eighth grade science class, and was wondering how likely I was to make any friends at my new school since it was April and long past the time that groups of kids are willing to let new people in, when Mikey leaned over to me and asked me if I liked Captain Astro. I told him I didn't know who he was, but that barely registered with him as he began to tell me of the Captain's latest adventure. I guess he was really eager for a new audience. Anyway, the next thing I knew, Mikey and I were best friends. 

The first time I wore my new baseball shirt to school, I felt great. For once I didn't look like a walking ad for Kmart. Even though my jeans were still hopeless, having a nice shirt made all the difference. When I grow up, I will always wear nice clothes. 

A couple of days later, I missed curfew and really got it from Pop. I couldn't have timed my arrival home worse. He had drunk just enough to be mean, but not enough that he would not have noticed the time. When I got up the next morning, I stood for a long while in front of the mirror, looking at the bruises. I had some nasty ones on my arms and on my back. Nothing new there. Those are the most popular spots. Pop tends to hold me by my arms, just above the elbows, and slam me back into the wall repeatedly as he's yelling at me. I sighed and rubbed the back of my head. It ached where it had connected with the wall a few times, and I could feel a bump there. At least my hair would hide that. That reminded me that I needed to pick out a suitable shirt to wear. Usually, after a run-in with Pop, I had to wear a long-sleeved shirt for a few days to hide the bruises on my arms. This could be awkward when it was very hot outside. People look at you funny when you are wearing long sleeves and it is 90 degrees out. I have even had kids ask me why I am not wearing a t-shirt. And it was sure hot that day. 

I stood in front of my closet, flicking through my tops with long sleeves, when the baseball shirt caught my eye. It occurred to me that it was the answer to my problem. Its 3/4-length sleeves hung long enough to hide my bruises, but not so long that anyone would think it odd that I was wearing it. I put it on, and went down to breakfast. 

When I came into the kitchen, Mom just looked at me. She didn't say anything, but her eyes lingered on the shirt's sleeves, and she kind of nodded. That day, when I got home from school, I found two more brand-new baseball shirts, in different colours, on my bed. 

The thing was that after that I found I wasn't that keen on wearing the shirts. I wore them when I had to, when I had something to hide, but as soon as the bruises faded, I'd go back to wearing the cheap, ugly t-shirts that Mom had picked out for me. Eventually, Mikey caught on to this. He knew about Pop. I'd told him; well, he'd mostly figured it out for himself. He swore he wouldn't tell anyone unless I agreed to it first, and I knew he'd keep his word, although it didn't stop him from bugging the crap out of me every time it happened about how we should tell someone - his mom, a teacher, even the cops, if you can believe it. That's all I need - a cop showing up at my door. Pop would kill me. 

Anyway, like I say, Mikey soon figured it out about the baseball shirts. Whenever he saw me in one, his face would get this tragic look on it, like someone had died or something. Honestly, you would think I was in a coffin, not a piece of clothing! In a way, though, it was kind of handy. He would just look at me and know, and so I never had to explain why I was I was not in a great mood, or why I couldn't do certain things. For example, one Saturday in June, I went over to Mikey's. We were supposed to be going swimming that afternoon, but as soon as he opened the door and saw me, he knew we couldn't. 

Just then his mom came up behind him and handed him his bathing suit and a towel. "There you go, sweetie," she said. 

"Thanks, Mom, but we've changed our minds. We're going to go to a movie instead," he replied. Mrs. Novotny looked surprised, but she didn't say anything. 

The next day, when we were reading comics up in his room, Mikey looked over at me and said, with a smirk, that his mom had asked him if he and I had developed some kind of mind- communications system. 

"What?" I asked, laughing. 

"Yeah," he said. She asked me about yesterday and how it was we decided to go to a movie rather than swimming without speaking. I told her we're like Captain Astro and Galaxy Lad. We can converse using secret, non-verbal signals." I snickered. Trust Mikey to make this relate to Captain Astro. 

"You know what, though?" Mikey went on. "It's kind of true, though, isn't it? I mean, that's what your baseball shirts are, aren't they? Secret, non-verbal signals?" 

"That's right, Mikey," I responded, laughing, "or should I say, Galaxy Lad? I'm Captain Astro and don't you forget it."

"How come you get to be Captain Astro?" he asked, pouting. But then he started to laugh along with me. We laughed for quite a while, until, for some reason, we both started to cry. 

When I grow up, I'm never going to wear baseball shirts. I fucking hate them.


End file.
